Obama’s Speech to the Muslim World

The most perfidious politician is one whose rhetoric is in line with what is correct, but whose actions are patently wrong. This is the conundrum that both Americans and the international community face when dealing with President Barack Obama. President Obama’s rhetoric and eloquence tend to give him the benefit of the doubt, that what he is saying is either the truth or will be the truth one-day. However, when one looks beyond rhetoric to the actual actions being taken and plans being made, many of Obama’s policies are as bad—and in some cases worse—as President George W. Bush’s. Obama’s much vaunted speech to the Muslim world delivered in Cairo, Egypt on June 4, 2009 illustrates the wide-gap between rhetoric and reality.

President Obama began his remarks by emphasizing the common connections America has with Islam and the Muslim world. He was right to emphasize that Islam has always been a part of America and that there are mosques in every state of the union. He praised Islamic cultures' contributions to the world as well as American Muslim’s contributions to the United States. He quoted liberally from the Qur’an and made it clear that America was not at war with Islam. All of this served to excite and inspire, but then he turned to America foreign policy in the Muslim world.

He discussed a wide range of topics, and his focus was on seven points:

1. Confronting violent extremism in all of its forms.
2. The situation between Israelis, Palestinians and the Arab world.
3. The rights and responsibilities of nations on nuclear weapons.
4. The issue of democracy.
5. The issue of religious freedom.
6. The rights of women.
7. Economic development and opportunity.

When looking at these points, it is important to note that the more detailed his discussions were the more flaws that were apparent in his positions. Conversely, the more general his discussion, the better his ideas seemed.

Turning to the issue of confronting extremism, he discussed Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Guantanamo. He began by stating that the US was going to be more liberal in giving developmental aid to Pakistan and Afghanistan which, of course, is something to be praised. However, Obama then goes on to say that all American troops will be out of Iraq by 2012. This is a lie. In Obama’s February 27, 2009 speech on ending the Iraq war, he states:

“As I have long said, we will retain a transitional force to carry out three distinct functions: training, equipping, and advising Iraqi Security Forces as long as they remain non-sectarian; conducting targeted counter-terrorism missions; and protecting our ongoing civilian and military efforts within Iraq. Initially, this force will likely be made up of 35-50,000 U.S. troops.”

Obama clearly stated that he plans on leaving behind a “transitional force” that will be “made up of 35-50,000 U.S. troops.” Furthermore, it is true that he has long held this position, as he emphasized this same point when he ran for President. What is clear from his position is that he does not plan a full withdrawal of troops from Iraq and his rhetoric hides reality. America has done this countless times in the past, hence why we still have troops stationed in Japan, Germany, and South Korea, even though conflicts in those regions have been over for many decades. America has strategic interests in Iraq—with the most obvious one being oil—that it will protect through its permanent mega-bases and an imperial embassy. American extremism in regards to excessive militarism should be confronted; instead, U.S. troops will not be out of Iraq by 2012 and it is doubtful that they well ever willingly leave.

Obama also stated that, “I have unequivocally prohibited the use of torture by the United States, and I have ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed by early next year.” This statement is misleading in that it only tells half of the story. The disconnect between rhetoric and reality is eminently clear for both the issue of torture and Guantanamo Bay.

Obama rightly deserved praise for prohibiting torture shortly after he was sworn in as President. While he is to be commended for attempting to bring the US back into compliance with the Convention Against Torture that was ratified by the US in 1988 and is binding US law, he has yet to fully comply with the treaty obligations to prosecute those who have conducted or permitted torture to occur. As Glenn Greenwald points out:

Ronald Reagan, May 20, 1988, transmitting the Convention Against Torture to the Senate for ratification:
The United States participated actively and effectively in the negotiation of the Convention. It marks a significant step in the development during this century of international measures against torture and other inhuman treatment or punishment. Ratification of the Convention by the United States will clearly express United States opposition to torture, an abhorrent practice unfortunately still prevalent in the world today.

The core provisions of the Convention establish a regime for international cooperation in the criminal prosecution of torturers relying on so-called "universal jurisdiction." Each State Party is required either to prosecute torturers who are found in its territory or to extradite them to other countries for prosecution.

Convention Against Torture, signed and championed by Ronald Reagan, Article II/IV:
No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat or war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture. . . Each State Party shall ensure that all acts of torture are offences under its criminal law.

It is clear that Obama is required under the law to prosecute those who have committed torture; however, he has repeatedly stated he will not seek prosecutions against those individuals in the Bush Administration who are alleged to have committed torture.

In terms of Guantanamo, the issue is more complex. Symbolically, Guantanamo has been a very visible stain on the image of justice in America. Obama was able to score a public relations victory by saying he would close the prison, but he still doesn’t abide by the principle that made Guantanamo so terrible, namely the denial of habeas corpus and the creation of kangaroo court-style military commissions. Glenn Greenwald notes that:

Many Democrats -- including Barack Obama -- claimed they were vehemently opposed to this denial of due process for detainees, and on June 12, 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court, in the case of Boumediene v. Bush, ruled that the denial of habeas corpus rights to Guantanamo detainees was unconstitutional and that all Guantanamo detainees have the right to a full hearing in which they can contest their accusations against them.

While the Supreme Court has affirmed the right for prisoners in Guantanamo to challenge their detentions in Court, Obama has done a bait-and-switch and has declared that prisoners in Bagram prison in Afghanistan do not have the right to challenge their detention. By allowing this, Obama is essentially giving blanket approval to the denial of habeas corpus to prisoners detained abroad. So while Obama can no longer indefinitely detain individuals in Guantanamo, he can do so in Bagram or any of the other many US prisons around the world. While it is nice that Obama has decided to end the prison in Guantanamo, he will continue the illegal denial of habeas corpus to prisoners held by the US all over the world.

Although Obama is not using the Bush version of military commissions anymore to try detainees in Guantanamo, he is using a modified system of military commissions rather than using the federal court system to try detainees. Because of this, these trials will lack legitimacy and the detainees will never receive justice. Furthermore, it has been alleged that conditions in Guantanamo have become worse since Obama became President. All of this is unacceptable and puts Obama in line with illegal Bush Administration policies.

On Obama’s discussion on the Arab-Israeli conflict, he clearly reaffirms America’s unshakeable bond with Israel while also recognizing that steps need to be taken to assure a two-state solution. He calls for both sides to abide by treaty obligations and that Israel should stop its settlement activity. He says he is committed to the peace process and will see it through to its fruition; however, many other Presidents have said this same thing and still the Palestinians remain stateless. Obama’s generalized rhetoric is encouraging, but his words need to be backed up with actions.

On nuclear weapons and democracy, Obama struck a positive note. He renewed his call for a nuclear-free world and that is something to be lauded. However, he has yet to take any steps to make this a reality. He called for people world-wide to determine their own way forward and what style of democracy they want to live in. Yet, he decided to deliver his speech in Egypt, a country that is ruled by a repressive dictator. So while Obama’s rhetoric was strong, again the reality of the situation remains starkly different.

On religious freedom and the rights of women, Obama made encouraging statements. He encouraged interfaith dialogue and tolerance between different religions and within religions. He recognized that women play a critical role in all societies and thpse societies with well-educated women tend to be prosperous. He also noted how Muslim countries such as Indonesia, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Turkey all had elected women leaders and that the rights of women need to be respected. In both of these areas there is very little to disagree with and the hope is that religious toleration increases and the rights of women are respected in both Muslim and non-Muslim countries around the world.

In terms of globalization and development, Obama recognized the challenges in these areas and strongly encouraged development. He recognized that the internet and television can bring both new ideas and loose morality. He said that Muslim countries can retain their heritage and still reach development, but it was up to these societies to do so. I strongly agree with this point as the Muslim world is trying to forge a new path for itself in the future.

Overall, Obama’s speech was meant to rehabilitate America’s image in the Muslim world and try to begin a new chapter. This is grand idea but talk is cheap. Obama will continue to occupy Iraq through at least 2012, he has escalated the war in Afghanistan, and he has expanded the global war on terror into Pakistan. He said, “Palestinians must abandon violence. Resistance through violence and killing is wrong and it does not succeed.” Why can’t Obama turn this statement around and realize that the US must abandon its violence, its extremism, and that killing is wrong and does not succeed?

Obama appears to be the ultimate salesman—he first marketed himself as the everyman and became President and now encourages the Muslim world to look beyond Americas current and historical clashes with them in favor of a nebulous new beginning. He desperately wants to show to the rest of the world that America wants to begin anew and should be trusted. Alas, he is hawking a cheap, superficial product that is breaking apart at its seams. While it is easy to be swept away by grandiose rhetoric, there is significant disconnect between his words and reality. The rosy image painted by Obama is not reality; it is an aspiration riddled with contradictions that necessarily precludes significant advancement in the areas Obama discussed. It would be great for America to turn a new page, but to do so rhetoric must finally begin to match reality.

-Nausherwan Hafeez, 9-15-09

[Book Review] American Pastoral

The American dream is quite a bit more complicated than the stories you hear. The book American Pastoral written by Philip Roth is an example of the inevitable dysfunction of trying to achieve this mythic concept. Roth, who is Jewish, tells the tale of a paradise lost for the protagonist, Swede Levov, whose hopes for an idyllic life are shattered by a bomb planted by his daughter Merry that killed an innocent doctor. I found this book to have extreme characters and a plot that tried too hard to represent American culture. Overall, I didn’t really find like this book that appealing and I would not recommend anyone to read it.

The plot was very much like an onion; you peel through layer after layer and find no significant substance in the middle. This book does a great deal of character development and the story follows the rise and fall of Swede Levov. Swede tends to follow a predetermined path of success by inheriting the family glove making business and achieves a good deal of initial success. He was a popular All-American kid that grew up in New Jersey and tried to pursue his version of the American dream. He was known for his placid demeanor and his friendly people skills. He was the paragon of moderation and a person who always lived up to his responsibilities.

In his life, he only challenged his family by marrying a genteel beauty queen who gives birth to his daughter Merry. He sets up a life for his family that is a caricature of perfection; he has wealth and status from running a profitable business and he couple’s this with the tranquility of being able to live on a farm. His life is the fusion of small-town America with a more benign version of capitalist America. All in all, he coasts through life by solving all problems and never has to deal with the nastier side of living. That is, until his daughter Merry becomes a radical anti-war activist and bombs a post-office in protest against the war in Vietnam. From this point on, his American dream collapses as Merry runs away. He tries desperately to get in touch with her, but his semblance of normality, of coasting through life without problems, his American dream, has been completely shattered. The veneer is destroyed and when he meets his daughter many years later, he is exposed to the dark-side of America; a land full of exploitation and greed that has basically crushed his daughter. His marriage falls apart and he does, as we find out early on the book, try to recreate some semblance of normalcy through a second marriage; however, his first marriage—which is the period in his life that is primarily discussed in this book—is exposed as hollow and that shit happens even to the people who follow all of the rules and societies norms.

The biggest problem I found with this book was that Roth tried to make the story too stereotypical of American culture and made his characters too extreme and well beyond the realm of believability. While it is true that all human beings are incredibly complex and it’s true that bad things happen can happen to good people, I found his presentation of these themes to be rather hyperbolic and unbelievable. All in all, I did not find this book to be that impressive, nor do I think that this book was really worth reading.

-Nausherwan Hafeez, 8-25-09

[Book Review] Islam: The Natural Way

Islam is meant to be the golden mean between all extremes. The central argument of Islam: The Natural Way by Abdul Hamid Wahid is to emphasize this point and explain a step-by-step way how Islam is the natural way for all of creation. This book, in general, is good at illustrating all of the basic beliefs in Islam in a very straightforward and easy way. I found the biggest weakness in this book to actually be the first chapter and there were a number of ideas in his book that weren’t explained as much as they should have been, and some concepts also need some more précising. Still, this book is a good way to find out about the basic beliefs in Islam, famous Sunnah and Hadiths, and particularly relevant quotations from the Qu’ran.

To begin with, this book starts on a very shaky foundation. The entire first chapter is aimed at disproving alternative viewpoints, the nature of and the belief in the existence of God, and the roots of Islam. The chapter does a very poor job of countering alternative worldviews and this section should be ignored. In terms of proving the existence of God, the author quickly comes to the conclusion that there is a God, but his reasoning has many holes in it. However, this books goal is not to explain alternative world viewpoints or discuss the more philosophical nuances in relation to the existence of God, but to explain to the reader what the fundamentals of Islam are about. Consequently, this chapter should be taken with a grain of salt, as the rest of the book focuses on Islam.

The second chapter is entitled “You and Your Condition” and gives an excellent discussion on the responsibilities, activities, and learning of man. The chapter quotes the Quranic verse that says, “On no soul does God place a greater burden than it can bear” (2:286, p. 37). This chapter argues that all men face different challenges and everyone has a variety of responsibilities; it is how we tackle these issues that determine whether or not we are successful in this life. This means that the individual should seek useful knowledge—and, of course, Islamic knowledge is sad to be obligatory—and live a balanced life. Everything is supposed to be done in moderation, and we all must be mindful of our sleep, exercise, cleanliness, fasting and personal issues. The emphasis in this chapter, along with the other chapters in this book, is how Islam is a rational path that leads all creatures to harmony.

The next couple of chapters discuss the individual in relation to their livelihood, family, neighborhood, community, and the universal Ummah.

One is supposed to make a livelihood that benefits oneself and is beneficial to the society. In Islam the dualistic concept of fard ‘ayn—duties obligatory on an individual such as prayers—and fard kifaayah—duties obligatory on the whole community—work in concert so that the individual has personal self-worth and is worthwhile to the community. So, for example, it would be a fard kifaayah for Muslim communities in the West to produce individuals in areas where there is a lack of Muslim representation in such as journalism, academia, and politics.

By earning a good livelihood, one is able to support a healthy family. The nuclear family—which is still emphasized in Western cultures—is critical for the process of tarbiyyah, that is the nurturing of the child. But, Islam also puts an emphasis on respect and relationships in the extended family, thereby broadening the social base of the religion. The basic unit of the family is marriage between a man and a woman. The author argues that,

“So far as the interaction between society, morality, and sex is concerned, there are four choice apparently open to any society:
1. an entirely homosexual society;
2. an entirely promiscuous society;
3. a society in which no sexual relations exist except between husband and wife;
4. a laissez-faire society in which all the above forms are tolerated.” (p. 116)

He goes on to argue that an entirely homosexual society would mean the death of our species. An entirely promiscuous society is thought by some to be the best, but he argues:

“ In such a society, it is imagined that everyone will have complete freedom to choose whoever he like at whatever time he prefers. With such freedom will come the deepest enjoyment as well as the reproduction of the species.

The reality will be different and there will be horrendous difficulties. People will become obsessed with sex. Strange as it may seem, sexual deprivation will be a major problem. Incest and deviant behavior will be common as it is in many societies that are promiscuous. Sexually transmitted diseases will spread.

The effects of all of this on human values and behavior are incalculable. Overall, it will have a degrading effect on sex itself and on human relationships. Sex will not be seen in the context of a whole, loving relationship, but will become an end in iteslef and in the process destroy respect, love, care and responsibility in human relationships.” (p. 117)

So he argues that the most natural state for a society is in which sex is regulated between the husband and the wife. In this sort of relationship, sex is actually encouraged by Islam, and sex is an act that is rewarded by God. He goes on to say:

“When you intend to have sexual intercourse with your wife, the noble Prophet advised that you should court her and approach her in a gentle manner, not in a rough way as animals do. And when you have satisfied yourself, you should wait until she is also satisfied.” (p. 122)

So sex is encouraged in Islam and leads to happiness for a married couple. This happiness can then be also employed and used to support the family.

As for the neighborhood, community, and universal Ummah, Islam teaches that you should be involved at all of these levels. It is said that you should not go to bed if your neighbor is hungry. Working within the community helps to foster natural social ties that bind everyone together. All of us are tied to the universal Ummah, as Muslims believe that no race is superior to any other, and that all people are brothers and sisters in Islam. This is why 25% of the worlds Muslims are Arabs and the largest Muslim country in the world is Indonesia. Islam in America exemplifies this fact, as it is the most ethnically diverse religious community in America. The true egalitarian nature of Islam can be seen in Mosques all across America where immigrant Pakistani’s can be seen praying next to indigenous African Americans and White Americans. It truly is the content of one’s character, not the color of their skin really matters.

The rest of the book discusses relationships with other faiths, global issues, and life after death. Islam argues that there is no compulsion in religion, and while Islam is said to be the universal religion for all mankind, people have the free will to believe what they desire to believe. Islamically it is believed at birth, we are all Muslims—i.e. creatures that submit to the will of God—and that through our varied circumstances, we are shaped into Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists or nonbelievers. Islam is meant to be a natural way to live a harmonious life and to prepare ourselves for the life after death. The gathering on Mount Arafat during the Hajj is meant to be a microcosm of mankind on the Day of resurrection, with billions of people hoping for salvation and eternal bliss.

All in all, I thought this was a good introductory book for the basics on Islam. Other good introductory books would be Islam: A Short History by Karen Armstrong and Muhammad: The Life of the Prophet by Martin Linges. The former gives a succinct overview of Islamic history and the later tells the story of Muhammad (pbuh) and his life. It is my personal belief that Islam is indeed the natural way and does a good job balancing individual concerns with concerns for the wider community.

-Nausherwan Hafeez, 5-24-09